The no-hitter hurricane season ends today

One of the most active — yet least consequential — hurricane seasons in history came to end on Tuesday.

By Joe CallahanStaff writer

One of the most active — yet least consequential — hurricane seasons in history came to end on Tuesday.

There were 19 named storms, 12 of which were hurricanes, during the season, which lasted June 1 to Nov. 30. The 19 storms tied 1887 and 1995 for the third most in a single season. But not one storm impacted Florida this year.

The record year was 2005, when 28 named storms streaked across the Atlantic. The second most was 21 in 1933. In those years, many of those storms impacted Florida and the United States.

But the same conditions that saved Florida from hurricanes also is partly to blame for a different kind of threat: an above-normal wildfire threat that has developed much earlier than normal.

This part of Florida is in the midst of a severe drought, one that fire experts say could lead all the way through spring, which is usually when the threat of wildfires is greatest.

Alachua County has a drought index of 612 on the Keech-Byram scale, which measures drought severity up to 800 points. Every 100 points on the scale equals one inch a person must dig into the ground to find moisture.

The 612 score puts Alachua County in the “severe” range, which is from 600 to 800 points and is the highest on the scale.

“It's looking extremely grim,” said Ludie Bond, a wildfire mitigation specialist for the Florida Division of Forestry who works in Gainesville.

Bond said wildfires are acting like they normally do in the spring when the typical wildfire season begins. Her observation is based on reported flame height and other criteria.

It is shaping up to be one of the worst fire seasons on record, including the 1998 outbreak. During that year, more than 500,000 acres burned throughout the state in a six-week span, destroying hundreds of homes.

Active hurricane season

Al Sandrik, the warning coordination meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Jacksonville, said the U.S. East Coast was spared in 2010 because of a perfect weather setup this hurricane season.

The Bermuda-Azores High set up further east in the Atlantic this year, closer to the Azores than to Bermuda. The closer the high is to Bermuda, the greater the risk that tropical systems will be steered into Florida.

The high was far east of Bermuda this year, and an upper-level trough hung over the southeastern United States. Those factors combined to steer storms away from the coast.

The storms that formed off Africa's west coast were steered by the high, which rotates clockwise. As they approached the U.S., the high pulled them north before hitting land.

“Those storms moved between the two [weather patterns]” and missed the eastern seaboard, Sandrik said.

Segue to drought

The problem, Sandrik said, is that those weather systems also blocked ever-important tropical waves from crossing Florida over the summer and fall.

Those tropical systems help produce much-needed rain. Coupled with the fact the area is in the middle of La Nina — which leads to a warm, dry fall and winter in this part of the country — Florida is becoming a tinderbox.

Weather experts and emergency management officials say the area is now in the eye of another potential damaging storm: a wildfire outbreak.

Dave Donnelly, Alachua County's emergency management director, said the focus must now shift from hurricanes to wildfires.

“That's the tradeoff,” said Donnelly.

Sandrik said the area is already in a drought: Less than an inch of rain has fallen in Alachua County in two months.

And La Nina promises less rain the normal over the winter, which is the driest part of the year to begin with.

And with warmer than normal temperatures, vegetation — fuel for wildfires — will grow more than usual.

And after the first freeze kills a lot of vegetation, there could be the perfect scenario for an active wildfire season.

Bond said the Florida Division of Forestry, along with the U.S, Forest Service and area fire rescue agencies, will be keeping a close eye on the situation.

This time of year, Bond said, it is usually man who starts the fires. Lightning fires usually do not start up until late May. Bond said community education will be vital in thee coming months in hopes of keeping the area's tinderbox from exploding.

Joe Callahan can be reached at joe.callahan@starbanner.com.

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